Last Updated on January 9, 2024
Video footage from New York City shows a small stained mattress being pulled from the illegal tunnel that was discovered beneath a Crown Heights, Brooklyn synagogue, where photographs show that, among other things, a high chair was located in the underground lair.
A riot broke out and a dozen men were arrested at the New York City synagogue that serves as the headquarters of the Orthodox Jewish Chabad movement when Jewish students tried to stop the NYPD and a team of construction workers from sealing off the illegal tunnel system dug beneath the building, reportedly to connect the synagogue to the site of a former Jewish women’s ritual bath.
In footage that has emerged of the standoff between NYPD officers and the synagogue’s congregants, a soiled mattress that appears to be sized for a child is pulled from the tunnel’s entrance. The footage has quickly gone viral on social media with serious questions being raised as to why the mattress was there.
Who is being forced to sleep on these child-sized soiled mattress hidden in illegal tunnels connected to a NYC Jewish temple? pic.twitter.com/SEGFWZWNHu
— Stew Peters (@realstewpeters) January 9, 2024
What’s more, is that a high chair is seen in a photograph of the tunnel system, which was sealed off by NYC authorities and reportedly filled with concrete, burying and destroying any potential evidence related to additional crimes possibly committed underground.
While it’s unclear exactly why the small stained mattress and high chair were among the things discovered in the sub-synagogue tunnel system, the Chabad movement has previously been linked to credible accusations of child sex abuse.
In 1991, one of the Chabad movement’s most prominent members, Hirschel Pekkar, who created the Chabad Menorah, admitted to “doing things that shouldn’t be done” to a 5-year-old girl, after she accused him of systematic sexual grooming, manipulation, and abuse.
Despite the admission, Pekkar faced no legal action and apparently no further scrutiny. The situation was kept within the Chabad movement, with a rabbinical court ordering Pekkar to be treated by an “expert counselor.”
This story is developing. Stay with National File for updates should they become available.